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Comment by avidiax | Hacker News Reader

I feel that everyone could learn and apply the idea of having clear, concise language without jargon.

I've hear this notion called "international English". English spoken in a way that non-native speakers find relatively easy to understand and follow.

The hard part of this is that non-native speakers will rarely ask for this. It's a gift that you have to give, and a gift you have to encourage others to give. And most of all, it needs to be done in a way so as not to be condescending, by simply being clear.

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I speak multiple languages fluently and people are always surprised when I share that my vocabulary is seriously limited. I learned it is an advantage. I am forced to use simple words to explain.

On the opposite end: I had a coworker, I only ever got about 30% of what he said. I thought it's my Japanese skills. He used complicated sentences and words all over the place. But when I asked other Japanese coworkers, they told me they could not understand him either.

> I am forced to use simple words to explain

I work with mostly Polish engineers and I am struck by how clear and concise their English verbal comms are. I admire it actually.

I'm a native UK English speaker and I wish I had the simple directness that the Poles, Dutch etc have.

If Japanese coworkers could not understand your coworker, is it that he used complicated sentences or that he couldn't use them correctly? Being able to explain things in simple terms is really useful, but it also means that you have to explain a lot more when conveying nuance or precision because you can't choose the word that means exactly what you want to say. Do you ever run into this, or do you feel the simple explanations can cover everything you want to communicate?

It's always interesting to watch how a bunch of non-native speakers of English from different countries sitting in a room can talk to each easily, but when a Brit or an American joins, the conversation immediately collapses.

In what way? What I've seen is the native English speaker bends over backwards to explain each and every idiom or try to not use them in the first place.

As a non native English speaker: British accent is harder to understand (I know there are many accents in the UK). American accent is easier to understand. Idioms are equally harder to understand in both.

For example “bend over backwards”. I get the meaning, but my brain would never produce that phrase. I would say something like “adapts”, “compromises”, etc.

Do you think there is any benefit from learning idioms? When speaking a non-native language, I always struggle with wanting to sound like a native speaker, and never using idioms and jargon makes me feel like I'm setting myself apart. However, it's really hard to use them correctly when you don't speak the language natively.

It's the general tempo of speech and speaking before you finish the thought that are the biggest roadblocks. ESL speakers usually talk like they are speaking in front of an audience, whereas natives talk like they are speaking in front of an audience, but they are DJT.

Wouldn't that international english be the same simple english (e.g., https://simple.wikipedia.org/wiki/Main_Page)?

I believe that this goes beyond vocabulary. It's more about who bears the burden in communication - in most cultures, it's the speaker, who is supposed to communicate clearly, and concisely. In western culture, it's the listener, who is expected to decipher whatever the speaker is talking about.

> In most cultures, it's the speaker, who is supposed to communicate clearly, and concisely. In western culture, it's the listener, who is expected to decipher whatever the speaker is talking about.

If you said this in Japanese, I'd say something like "Hmm, that seems a bit...". And you'd be expected to figure out what the rest of the sentence was.

To be more clear, I don't think the generalization you're making is valid. My experience of non-"Western" cultural communication styles has not at all been uniformly more direct and clear. I think some subcultures in the US have an annoying habit of doing what you describe (e.g. "if you can't follow this you must be dumb" kind of mentality) but many others do not.

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